Those are loaded words when you’re part of a community of people with disabilities. Far too many people have been derided as stupid and useless for far too long. Yet those words struck a chord with me.

“Stupid useless pain is much harder to bare than pain with purpose.” –Dr. David Schnarch

I read these words in a book about marital relations. Of course, the book in question addresses far more serious situations than I am concerned with, but I’m finding the basic tools are applicable. More to the point, the pain I thought of when I read these words did not involve (at least, not directly) my husband Mark.

I’m not prone to hyperbole, so believe me when I say the last two months have been hell for me. I’ve had meds messing with my mind. I’ve had so many troubles and complications that I’ve given up hope, gotten it back, given it up, and gotten it back more times than I can count. I’ve been sick for over a month and got so used to feeling weak and dulled that I didn’t realize how far I’d slipped until I started to climb back up to my strength. I’ve been angry at God. I’ve coughed until my lungs hurt and then coughed some more. And, no matter how much I try to get back on track, I keep slipping back into a cycle of decline-and-recovery. I’m still not even with myself.

Most of this time, I’ve felt like everything I’ve been going through was stupid and useless. It’s been painful—physically, mentally, emotionally, and spiritually painful—and it was useless and stupid and ENOUGH IS ENOUGH ALREADY!!!

Like most human beings, I seek relief when I’m in pain; yet, I’ve gone through some incredibly painful experiences and I’ve bore them much better because I’ve understood their purpose. I’ve born these last two months quite poorly. I’ve done things I despise, like yelling at my child for being uncooperative because I just couldn’t handle one more thing. I haven’t done things that I should, like finishing all the work I promised to my clients months ago.

As an adult, when Mark moved to a new place, he’d walk around until he got thoroughly lost in order to learn more about the place he chose to live. On the other hand, we took a trip as a family and I ended up missing an important turn. Instead of going down I-35, we were going down I-90. We got so lost and mixed up trying to cut across between the two that Mark literally used the sky to navigate for me. I hate being lost. Mark takes it in stride and he finds the way forward.

These last two months I’ve been lost and I hated every moment of being lost. I hated being weak. I hated being tired. I hated being in pain. I hated my complete inability to turn things around. I was fighting so hard against the things I hated and I wasn’t getting anywhere. It was stupid useless pain and it was eating me alive.

Then, I stopped fighting. This time it wasn’t a matter of giving up; it was more a matter of looking around and looking up. Two things occurred to me. First, I knew that I had finally completed my memoir and that, whatever happens, it will be published. Second, I saw that in trying to start from scratch I’d begun writing again.

Granted, my business is a writing business. I’m always writing something. But everything I’d been writing since I obtained my graduate degree in writing was written with a specific purpose in mind. Whether it’s for a client or for myself, it’s all been driven by a purpose, by an objective, by a goal. Everything I’ve written has been practical.

I am not, naturally, a practical person. I’m a dreamer. In living my dreams, I’ve pursued practical purposes that, together, are supposed to realize my dreams. But practicality doesn’t come naturally to me. Dreaming does. So, when it came time to replenish my creative well, I started writing the passionate ideas that came to me—without a predefined purpose. And it was liberating.

Now, practically speaking, I’d stopped writing in order to better use my time in my writing business. I suspect that there was no other way to get me writing again than to knock me so thoroughly down that I had to go back to my roots as a writer just to stand myself back up. You see, decades ago when I started writing, it wasn’t with purpose—just passion. I loved to write. Writing excited me. It thrilled me. Cultivating my talent and turning it into a business was something I was proud of, something I loved.

Then, once I’d actually got my business up and running, there came the pressure and the consequences of that pressure and the consequences of those consequences. I became driven. I was still inspired and I was still passionate, but I wasn’t using that passion or that inspiration, not to its fullest. I was working towards a purpose. Everything else fell to the wayside, including the love I had for what I was doing.

So, while I’m still recovering, I’m recovering with a purpose. I’m recovering my faith. I’m recovering my inspiration. I’m recovering my work ethic. And, yes, I’m recovering my health, too. My life is imbalanced, but I’m getting better now that I have a purpose I can really live with, despite the pain. And I’m about one-fourth of the way through the first draft of a novel that I’ve been trying not to write for at least six months. Now, that was stupid and useless, wasted effort. And I realized it by realizing, once again, that pain is necessary for growth and renewal.